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I visited a local park this morning and the best I could manage was this image of a fig. This is straight out of the box- no PP. I'd appreciate your input on how I could make it more interesting next time I drag my lazy arse out of bed bright and early. If there's anything that can be done in PS6 to give this a bit more impact, I'd also appreciate your input. Feel free to play with the photo as you see fit.

 PS. Following our chat out the front of Birdy's, please go easy on me Chris and Philo

Nice light fall on fig trunk but background too distracting which is combination of your positioning, lens selected, perspective used the fact that there isn't really a strong focus point for the eyes etc. A focal point visual magnet could be generated by an in your face perspective including that wonderful light.

Also take care of detail crushed can or red piece of paper sitting between roots in foreground.

Idea- Maybe a vertical crop tighter on trunk with perhaps wide angle say 12-24 Low and closer to avoid background distraction a few well placed autumnal leaves in foreground which lead with the tree buttresses to the main trunk and wonderful light (take care with DOF i.e. hyperfocal focussing in this technique). Hope this makes sense ABG but your sense of seeing photographically is developing well

cheers
marco

I was sitting here pondering and thinking more along the lines of taking another shot from a different angle rather than PP'ing this one, when Marco added good input...

I was basically thinking lower down concentrating on the texture of the trunk and framing the background out of the shot, but never noticed the can or paper in the foreground

Must admit, when I'm chasing waterfall stuff I always spend some time doing the gardening in the area, removing dead or broken twigs off tree ferns, releasing built up muddy leaves stuck in water etc...

doesnt do a lot for me.

the image doesnt have a lot of contrast, busy backgroud etc.

Steve

I like detrius in shots - it just shows how bad we are as humans. That aside, the colours to me are totally indictative of dawn and the only other comment I would make, would be to crop tighter on the trees, to remove most of the background from the RHS

Thanks for the honest replies guys. I really don't think much of it either. I was walking around the park without a clear idea in my mind of what I wanted to capture and my photos reflect that. I really liked the way the light was falling on the tree, but I failed completely to convey the beauty of what I saw. I really need to remember to look more closely and objectively at what the lens is capturing and exclude the extraneous parts that distract from the subject.

The main reason for posting it was to keep a promise I made to Birdy to post some photos with the goodies that I picked up for a song at the mini meet. There's more to come Thanh and I promise there'll be better than this rubbish.